Canada's mighty eights fade to last in rowing

Ed Willes, The Province, Postmedia Olympic Team07.28.2012

A member of Canada's women's eight crew reaches from the boat during training in Eton Dorney, near Windsor, England, at the 2012 Summer Olympics, Friday, July 27, 2012. The rowing competition starts on Saturday.

ETON-DORNEY - Their performance was so dismal, so utterly unexpectedand out of character, there had to be some kind of explanation.

Maybe they shut things down around the 1,000-metre markwhen they realized they couldn’t win. Maybe they were playing possum. Maybetheir intention was to concede the first heat to the powerful German boat andlull them into a false sense of security.

Any of those things might have explained what happened onLake Dorney.

It’s just that none of them were applicable.

“It was just a bad race,” said Canadian cox Brian Price.

And now the men’s eights have one day to figure out whatwent wrong and fix it.

On Saturday, before a sellout crowd of some 30,000 on theEton College rowing basin, the defending Olympic gold medallists finished adistant fourth, and last, in their heat, which included the favoured Germancrew, Britain and the Netherlands.

The news isn’t all bad for the Canadians. They simplyhave to finish in the top four of the six-boat repechage on Monday to qualifyfor Wednesday’s medal race.

But given the events of Saturday, it appears theirpresence in that final is no longer a given.

“Physically there’s nothing else we can do,” said Price,the veteran cox who’s at his third Olympics. “Everything is in our heads atthis point. It’s up to us to believe in each other and the training we’vedone.”

Price wasn’t the only member of the Canadian crew donninga hair shirt.

“I’m still the leader of this crew and I’m the personwho’s supposed to prepare these guys,” said Malcolm Howard who, with Price andAndrew Byrnes, are veterans of the Beijing boat. “I think after a race likethat I feel that responsibility and I feel anger toward myself. It’s what I dowith that and what we do with it as a crew to improve it.”

Elsewhere on Saturday, the Canadian double of MichaelBraithwaite and Kevin Kowalyk finished fifth and last in their heat and willmove to repechage.

The eight, for their part, entered the first day ofrowing as an intriguing, if not unknown, quantity at the Olympic level.Everyone from Price to Howard to coach Mike Spracklen has said the boat is morepowerful than its Beijing counterpart.

They also set a world-best time in their heat at theWorld Cup in Lucerne a couple of months ago.

But the boat also has six first-time Olympians and, onSaturday, their inexperience showed. Or something showed. The start was decentbut, just after the 500-metre mark, the German and British crews surged.

And the Canadians had no response.

“If that had happened to us before, I don’t think we’dhave let it happen to us again,” Howard said of the boat’s youth. “Sometimesyou can put that down to inexperience. But it’s what you make of it. We have topick ourselves up and focus on what’s right. I mean, that’s what it’s about.”

Those connected to the Canadian crew insisted the boatstill has medal potential.

“I know what we have because I train with these guysevery day,” said Price. “I know we have the ability. There’s so much psychologythat comes into performing in a big race. That’s the barrier we have toovercome. We have to bust that down.”

“They’re a quality crew,” said Peter Cookson, RowingCanada’s high-performance director. “I think when we get to the final we’ll beready to go. They’re a crew of character. They have a lot of internalstrength.”

Canada's mighty eights fade to last in rowing

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